Chapter 16
NICO
After my night with Elle, I feel like I can no longer avoid uncovering the truth about that night. I have my theories and suspicions, and I know where a few loose ends lead, but even I don’t know who masterminded the shooting and why they had Elle’s mother murdered to begin with.
I was content for years to only look into it as far as it benefited me. But now I can’t leave it alone, not after letting Elle in.
She deserves to know the truth about what happened to her mother, and whoever was in charge of it deserves to be punished.
I don’t normally pride myself on being any sort of righteous vigilante—to the contrary, most would consider me a self-serving loner, but I do still have a threat of moral dignity inside my soul, and that means I won’t be able to look Elle in the eyes again unless I find out the truth.
After she returns to the city, I decide to pay someone a visit—her father, Detective Hale Monroe.
If assholes are icebergs, then this guy is the tip of one for sure. He’s cold, overly ambitious, and manipulative. He’s used the police force as a means to play multiple sides for his own gain. He’s not just a dirty cop; he’s stained in all the ways that make someone a terrible person.
When I get in the car to head back into the Strip and over to the police station, I mull over the pieces of the puzzle that I already know.
I’d heard about the rival mafia family’s involvement through rumors, and the boss at the nightclub that I told Elle about definitely had his hand in all of this.
But both my sleuthing and my keen instincts have always pointed me toward suspecting Detective Monroe as the one who orchestrated Elle’s mother’s murder.
I haven’t claimed that as a fact since I have no proof of it.
But for me, my gut instinct is all the proof I need to go and confront the bastard.
I’ve always had a bad feeling about Elle being around her father after that night and the cover-up that ensued.
Now that I feel the devout urge to protect her, I feel even worse about it.
If he could have his own wife killed, then what’s to say he wouldn’t do the same to his daughter?
I need to confirm that it was him and find out the truth as to why a crooked cop would hire someone to kill his wife.
Even for a guy like Hale Monroe, it seems like an unthinkable thing to do.
But then again, I’ve seen the unthinkable happen right before my eyes more than once.
When I pull up to the station, I wait until it empties out.
At this time of day, several of the cops take lunch breaks and go on the kinds of “patrols” that involve staring at some strippers through club windows and eating a funnel cake in their patrol car.
The station’s two remaining cops are the intake officer sitting at the front desk near the door, and Detective Monroe, who is likely holed up in his office making backdoor deals with some of the city’s most corrupt players.
I pause for a moment before getting out of my car to go inside.
Walking right through the front door of places isn’t my usual style.
But there is something about this particular interaction that makes me feel like I want to handle it a bit differently.
I’m still haunted by the knowledge of my passive role that night, and if I’m correct about all of this, and Hale Monroe really is the man behind his wife’s murder, then I don’t want to keep to the shadows when confronting him. I want him to see me coming.
“Can I help you?” the intake officer asks without even looking up as I walk in. He must have heard the door open because his face is still glued to some reel he’s watching on his cell phone.
The taxpayers really pay these assholes too much.
“I’d like to speak with Detective Hale Monroe,” I say.
“Sorry, he’s busy. Unless it’s an emergency, you’ll need to call back tomorrow and schedule an appointment.”
“He’s not busy. And it’s going to be an emergency if another word leaves your trap hole.”
The cop abruptly looks up at me with an indignant glare that instantly drops from his face as soon as he sees my gun pointed at his face. I might not have slipped inside like the Ghost, but I still am the Ghost.
“Make a move and your face turns into meatloaf,” I warn him quietly as I reach for a set of handcuffs near his desk to cuff him in and a rag to stuff in his mouth. “You ever seen your mother make meatloaf?”
He doesn’t say a word, so I just keep talking.
“My mother used to make meatloaf when she was still alive. She used to take the ground beef and pound it with a meat mallet, even more than it was already mashed up, until it became so soft that it was practically butter—red, bloody, soft meat. That’s what your face will look like if you make a sound or get up from this desk. Do you understand?”
He nods, but his eyes betray him and glance around the room.
“Oh, and just so you know,” I whisper as I lean down closer to his face. “They call me the Ghost because I will, in fact, haunt you until the very moment of your death if you defy me. And even after that, I will make your afterlife insufferable.”
I straighten my back and give him a stiff pat on the shoulder. I can tell by the look in his eyes that he’s not going to move or make a sound after my words. Then, I make my way toward Hale’s office. When I open the door, I’m greeted with a slew of curse words.
“For fuck’s sake, Dan, I told you not to bother me today.
I’m busy with private business. Do your fucking job and mind the desk or else I’ll find some other ass-kisser to sit there, and I’ll put you out on patrol.
” Hale Monroe is every bit as eloquent as I expected him to be, which is to say, not at all.
“I assume Dan is your intake officer? Pity that he’s tied up right now, but I’ll be sure to relay your message to him,” I say, unfazed.
Hale reaches for his gun, but I’m faster than he is.
It takes me less than a measurable second to round his desk and pull it out of his hand before he can even take the shot. What an inept piece of shit this guy is.
“I would suggest that you don’t try to be an idiot again,” I warn as I take his gun and search him for another.
“What do you want?” he hisses at me.
“Ah, so you know who I am? I have to admit that’s impressive. Most people don’t.”
“I only know who you are because I saw you that night,” he says.
For a second, I’m taken aback.
Then, as if my memory unlocks in real time, I remember seeing another person in the alley that night. It was a blip, only a flitting silhouette of a man, and my focus was on the gunman and on Elle. But now this brings everything into full focus—Hale Monroe was there.
“I wondered how long it would take before you finally came and confronted me,” he says as if he’s trying to insult my intelligence.
“Honestly, I was starting to think that your reputation was just a bunch of hype. All those mafia bosses talk about the Ghost as if he’s some sort of mythical legend with supernatural skills.
And yet it took you years to figure out it was me. ”
“Trust me, I’ve had a hunch about you all along,” I say through gritted teeth. “I’ve just been letting you fester and rot before coming to claim the truth from your putrid mouth.”
“A hunch?” he laughs. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
I take a seat in the chair across from his desk. This is going to take a few minutes to squeeze out of him. It’s an infection that has been covered up and growing for years now.
“I’m talking about how you had your wife murdered,” I say matter-of-factly. “You had the mother of your child killed in front of your twelve-year-old daughter’s eyes. And I’m here to find out why.”
Hale squirms a bit in his seat as if he’s going to circle back and deny this now, but it’s too late for denial.
“And before you decide that you’ve suddenly forgotten what you just admitted to by being in that alley that night, let me remind you of something,” I say as I strum my fingers on the surface of his desk between us.
“I can kill you and your man outside without blinking an eye or making a sound. I can also wipe your security camera footage clean in a matter of seconds with a quick phone call to a friend. I can make it look like you had a mental breakdown and killed your cop friend before killing yourself, all under the weight of guilt that you’ve carried with you for years over the murder of your wife.
Or you can fess the fuck up before I decide that this isn’t worth my time. ”
“What do you want to know?” he asks, spoken like a true coward who wants to save his own ass.
“Tell me why you were in the alley that night.”
His eyes narrow as he glares at me. Hale is furious at the fact that I have the upper hand and that he finally, finally has to answer for what he’s done.
“I wanted to see that the job was completed,” he says. “I wanted to be sure that it got done correctly.”
“And by correctly, you mean you wanted to see for yourself that your wife was killed?”
“Yes.”
“And that your daughter was spared?”
Hale nods. “I had no desire to hurt Elle, neither back then nor now.”
“You did hurt her. You had her mother killed right in front of her. That was a monstrous thing to do.”
“Monstrous or not, I did what I had to do,” he says.
“Tell me why.”
Detective Monroe has little left to lose at this point. He’s been caught. He knows I can blow his cover or shoot both his legs off if I so choose. I’m the one holding the cards here now, and he’s about to give up the game.
“I had my wife killed because she was going to leave me,” he fesses up.
“Color me surprised,” I sneer sarcastically. “Who would ever want to leave a catch such as yourself? Seems like you took a bit too much offense to that rejection, though. Most men’s egos aren’t bruised enough to have their wives murdered.”
“I didn’t just have her killed because she was leaving me,” he glares.
“Elle’s mother had all the dirt on me. She knew about all the dealings I had with the mafia, all the books I cooked, and all the crimes I turned a blind eye to.
I confided all of those secrets to my wife because I needed an outlet to vent to.
It got stressful trying to play several sides at once and keep it all to myself. ”
I’ve known a lot of weak men in my life, but this guy really takes the cake. Not only is he corrupt and crooked, and not only is he a morally vapid wife-murderer, but he’s also weak as fuck.
“She was going to go to the police,” he says as if that statement will drive the point home.
“You are the police,” I remind him.
“The information she was going to release to expose me would have not only ruined my career but also my entire life. All of my connections would have been out in the open. Every mafia boss I’d ever dealt with would have come after me for having told my wife about what I, and they, were doing.
The Chief of Police would have not only fired me but likely also pressed charges against me.
My reputation would have been ruined, and I would have been either dead or bankrupt by the time our divorce was finalized,” he bemoans.
“I tried to get her to stay quiet. I tried to silence her through threats and even promises and bribes. But that damn woman thought she was a saint or something, and she wouldn’t relent.
She said that our daughter deserved better than to have a crooked cop as a role model, and that I needed to atone for what I’d done. ”
“So, you had her killed,” I say with disgust. “And you had it done in front of your daughter.”
“That part wasn’t exactly as planned. I didn’t know that she was taking Elle to see the show with her that night.
I thought she was going alone,” Hale says without an ounce of empathy or regret in his voice.
“Once the two of them were in the alley together, it was too late to change the plan. And it worked—my wife was murdered, and my daughter was spared. The only thing that didn’t work out that night was the fact that you were there to witness it all.
Elle was just a child; she would have eventually forgotten about it. ”
“I can assure you that she would never forget about that,” I growl at him as my anger grows and my patience wanes. “And the man you sent to kill your wife would have killed Elle, too. I saved her from that murder, becoming a double homicide. What kind of man puts his daughter in danger like that?”
“A desperate one,” he answers. “My wife forced my hand, and I did what needed to be done in order to save myself.”
It takes everything I have not to shoot this bastard right here and now. But if I did that, Elle still wouldn’t find the closure that she thinks she so desperately needs. She needs to know what really happened that night, and she needs to hear it straight from this bastard’s mouth.
I lean back in my chair, debating how I want to handle the rest of this little impromptu meeting.
Part of me feels as though the burden that I’ve been carrying around for years has suddenly been lifted.
The monster that night wasn’t me. It was the man that Elle calls father.
My closure with this situation has been attained, and now it’s time to give Elle hers.
“You’re going to tell your daughter the truth,” I say. “After everything that you’ve put Elle through, she deserves that much from you at least.”
“And if I politely decline?” he asks in a measly tone.
“There is no declining here,” I say as I stand up and point my gun at his groin.
“If you thought your wife had you in a bad position all those years ago, I can assure you that I have you in a much tighter vice now. You will confess your sins to your daughter and tell her what you’ve done and why, so that Elle can finally find peace. ”